UNDERGRADUATE

Old Chicago” criticized the grid as drab, monotonous,
and lacking in imagination. Additionally, the authors
criticized many of the typical urban characteristics of
these three neighborhoods—buildings were said to be too
close together, yards too small, traffic levels on non-major
streets too high, and the prevalence of mixed land-uses
was seen as being highly undesirable. 12
After listing the perceived flaws of the current built
environment of the city, the authors of “Rebuilding Old
Chicago” presented a series of ambitious large-scale
redevelopment plans that they felt would bring these
neighborhoods up to “modern planning standards” and
remedy their perceived blight. Remedies presented in
the three plans included eliminating secondary streets,
creating much larger blocks, and decreasing traffic
through the neighborhoods by funneling through-traffic
to major streets or proposed “super highways.” Additional
space created by the elimination of secondary streets, and
the increased block size would be converted to green space
and off-street parking. Ribbon development of businesses
and stores along commercial streets would be largely
eliminated and replaced with shopping centers oriented
around off-street parking lots. In one neighborhood plan,
the authors explained that, “Orderly shopping centers,
as opposed to ribbon development of stores, are planned
at transfer points… Each store group is provided with a
special parking area for shoppers’ cars.” 13
“Rebuilding Old Chicago” was created, in the words
of its authors, to illustrate “the principles of good
neighborhood planning” and “to demonstrate methods
of adapting typical existing conditions to modern site
planning techniques.” 14 The authors made sure to state
explicitly that the plans presented were only meant to
be informative and were not official or bound in any way,
explaining that, “The studies herein presented should
12 Chicago Plan Commission, ““Rebuilding Old Chicago: City Planning
Aspects of the Neighborhood Redevelopment Corporation Law,” Oct.
1941, Municipal Reference Collection, Harold Washington Library,
Chicago, 14-16.
13 Chicago Plan Commission, “Rebuilding Old Chicago,” 3.
14 Ibid.
be considered strictly as illustrations of the principles of
good neighborhood planning. Although actual sites have
been selected, this is purely to demonstrate methods
of adapting typical existing conditions to modern site
planning techniques.” 15
The plans presented in “Rebuilding Old Chicago” illustrate a
thorough departure from the traditional planning of Chicago.
With their plans, the authors imagined neighborhoods
that would provide suburban features and amenities, like
ample yards and green space, off-street parking, minimal
traffic through neighborhoods, modern homes removed
from major thoroughfares, and suburban-style shopping
centers conveniently accessible by automobile to future
residents of the three neighborhoods chosen. To the authors
of “Rebuilding Old Chicago,” such neighborhoods as they
envisioned planned and laid out in accordance with the most
modern and enlightened planning standards of the day and
represented a far superior living environment than those
they sought to replace. Whereas, to them, the neighborhoods
they selected to be reimagined were, in their current state,
cramped, disorderly, and dilapidated, the new neighborhoods
they envisioned would be just the opposite—spacious,
orderly, modern, and, perhaps most importantly, safely
removed from the hazards of urban life.
Another document, “Building New Neighborhoods:
Subdivision Design and Standards,” produced two years
later, similarly reveals the Chicago Plan Commission’s
vision for postwar Chicago. As the titles suggests,
whereas “Rebuilding Old Chicago” dealt with rebuilding
aged neighborhoods that were felt to be blighted and
inconsistent with modern planning standards, the purpose
of “Building New Neighborhoods,” published in July
of 1943, was to establish “modern standards of design”
for new neighborhoods on vacant and undeveloped
land within the city limits. As Chairman George T.
Horton and Acting Executive Director of the Chicago
Plan Commission H. Evert Kincaid explained in their
introduction to the document, “Within the corporate limits
15 Ibid.
DEPAUL UNIVERSITY
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